Appointments
Appointments
When it comes to thinking about your future, the Career Zone is here to support you whatever stage you are at. Whether you have a clear career in mind, a few ideas or none at all, we can help.
We offer a variety of both face-to-face and online appointments including:
- Careers Guidance - for help making career decisions or exploring your career/further study options. Further information about guidance appointments.
- Careers Advice - for help finding and applying for jobs and postgraduate courses, as well as advice on all stages of the recruitment process.
- CV/covering letter, application form and LinkedIn profile check – for graduate jobs, internships, part-time jobs and postgraduate courses.
- Placements Advice - to discuss finding and applying for placements as part of your degree programme.
If you are a Business School student please visit Handshake to learn what appointment types are available to you and how to book these. Undergradute students' appointment information or postgraduate taught students' appointment information.
If you are a PGR student please visit the PGR students' appointment booking page.
Unfortunately INTO students are unable to access careers appointments.
Key information about booking and attending appointments
In most cases, you will need to book an appointment by contacting the Career Zone.
In some instances, you may be able to self-book an appointment online. The following appointment types are available to book on Handshake. Ensure you select the correct category before booking.
- Business School students – visit Handshake for more information - undergraduate students' information or postgraduate students' information.
- Law School Students can self book careers guidance appointments. Choose the 'Law School Guidance' category. Streatham students can choose Law Careers for Law Students or Non-Law Careers for Law Students appointments. There is a single appointment type for Penryn students.
- Mock Interviews and Recruiter in Residence appointments are available at certain times during the year, usually in autumn. These will be advertised via newsletters. They can also be searched for in Handshake events using the Mock Interview event type filter.
- Work Placements support - if you are planning on undertaking a work placement as part of a credit-bearing module, you can use this appointment type to get advice on applying for placements or anything else related to your placement. Choose the 'Work Placements' category.
If you are required to upload a document in advance of the appointment, for example you have a CV review booked, please ensure the document(s) are uploaded the day before the appointment. This page has information about how to upload a document - Handshake guide to uploading documents.
You should be prepared for your appointment:
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Have a clear idea of what you want to get out of the appointment.
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Plan your questions in advance.
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Due to the length of appointments only one topic can usually be covered, so please focus on that.
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Have a means of creating your own notes, this could be a device or pen and paper.
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Check the booking details so you are clear where and when it takes place.
Please view the additional information about maximising your appointent for guidance, CV and casual jobs appointments.
You should attend on time. If you have an in person appointment you should usually aim to arrive 5 minutes before the start time. Check the confirmation email to see any instructions about where and when to attend. If your appointment is online, check the channel being used and check the accordion below if you have any issues.
If you are more than 10 minutes late for your appointment, your appointment will not go ahead and will be recorded as a 'no show'.
At the time of booking you will have been given details of where your appointment will take place. Most face-to-face appointments take place at either the Forum (Streatham) or the Exchange (Penryn). Please arrive a few minutes in advance of your appointment start time and if you are meeting in the Forum or the Exchange, report to the front desk so the Career Zone staff know you have arrived. The staff member who will be meeting with you will come and greet you before taking you to the private appointment space.
However your online appointment takes place:
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Ensure you have turned your device on, logged into Handshake (or Teams/Zoom as appropriate), and if necessary, tested your camera and microphone are working, at least 5 minutes before your appointment time.
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Ensure you are situated in a quiet, private and safe location, where you are able to speak.
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If the consultant or advisor has requested any information from you before your appointment, e.g. CV, please ensure you have provided this as requested. You will usually be asked to upload documents to Handshake.
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Ensure you are prepared to take notes during the appointment.
Handshake
Most appointments take place through the video platform in Handshake. To access, go to the appointment. There should be a Join Video Appointment button. This is greyed out until 5 minutes before the start time when it becomes active.
If you have any issues please check the Handshake video troubleshooting page.
Mock Interviews
You will be emailed a Teams link in advance of the appointment.
Microsoft Teams
When the appointment is due to start the staff member you are booked in with will contact you via Microsoft Teams. You therefore need to ensure that Teams app is installed on your device and you are logged into your student Microsoft Teams and ready to receive their call. New to Teams? Help Installing Teams. Teams FAQs
Zoom
You will receive a link for the meeting when your appointment is booked. You will need Zoom to be installed on your device. You can find the Zoom link if you view the upcoming appointments in Handshake. Open the relevant appointment and link should be in left hand column in the WHERE section.
If you are not going to be able to attend your appointment you should cancel the booking at the earliest opportunity. You can do this by opening the booking in Handshake and click on the Cancel Appointment button. This button is available up to 10 hours in advance of the start time. If you want to cancel within 10 hours of the start time you will need to contact the Career Zone.
It is not possible to cancel an appointment after the start time. Where an appointment is not cancelled before the start time and you do not attend it will be recorded as a 'no show'.
If you do not attend an appointment and have not cancelled the booking this will be recorded as a ‘no show’. If you persistently ‘no show’ you will lose access to your Handshake account for a specified period. Any event and appointment bookings you have during this period will be cancelled.
Please see the Career Zone attendance policy for further details.
Anything said in an appointment will remain confidential and won’t be shared with anyone else. A brief record of what was discussed during your appointment may be made on Handshake. This is done for continuity in the event you were to see a different person from the Careers Team in the future.
If a disclosure is made during the appointment and we are made aware of any risk of harm to yourself or anyone else we won’t be able to keep this confidential. We have a duty of care to escalate the disclosure to keep everyone safe.
Responsibilities of student/graduate
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You are expected to behave in a professional manner as you would in the world of work. Being prepared, punctual and cancelling in advance if unable to attend.
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You should read the pre appointment email and check any information about attendance. For online appointments it will note the medium and for in person where and when to attend.
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You will only usually be able to cover 1 topic in the appointment so please focus on that.
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You should attend the appointment with a means of making your own notes.
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If you are required to provide documents for the appointment, these should be uploaded the day before the appointment.
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You should attend on time and be suitably prepared.
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If attending an in-person appointment you should adhere to the University Covid policies.
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If attending an online appointment you should be in a quiet, private location where you are able to take part in the appointment appropriately.
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If attending an online appointment you should check the channel and login in advance. You should check that your device is able to connect to the appointment.
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If you are aware you will be unable to attend an appointment you should cancel the booking at the earliest opportunity.
Attendance Policy Summary
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If you do not attend your appointment and have not cancelled the booking it will be recorded as a no show. If you are more than 10 minutes late for an appointment it will be recorded as a no show.
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We will email people who have a no show recorded to remind them of the need to cancel bookings if they are unable to attend and remind them of the attendance policy.
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In cases of persistent no shows, access to Handshake will be suspended. The trigger will be 3 or more no shows in 30 days.
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If you have 3 or more no shows recorded within 30 days, your Handshake account will be suspended for 14 days and any appointment or event bookings during this period will be cancelled and you will not be able to attend any careers appointments or events during the period while your account is suspended.
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On the third time you trigger an account suspension (at least 9 no shows), your Handshake account will be suspended for 30 days. Any appointment or event bookings during this period will be cancelled and you will not be able to attend any careers appointments or events during the period while your account is suspended.
- If, in the unlikely event, you subsequently trigger another account suspension (at least 12 no shows) we reserve the right to take further measures as appropriate.
MBTI and other psychometric and personality tests can be used to help you understand yourself better with the support of a qualified careers consultant to facilitate career guidance discussion. There are limitations to these tests, and they shouldn’t be used in an isolated manner to inform career decision making. Defining a person by just their MBTI result isn’t the purpose of MBTI and it should be remembered that no psychological measure is absolutely perfect.
Career Zone is committed to making appointments as accessible and inclusive as possible, including meeting the needs of students with disabilities. If you have any support needs or AccessAbility requirements, please contact us and let us know as soon as possible. If there are any reasonable adjustments we can make (e.g. meeting you to open doors) to help you participate, please let us know and we will do our best to accommodate.